We must protect free speech from ‘woke’ warriors
THAT the purpose of education is not “the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire” is an adage often attributed to the great Irish poet WB Yeats, perhaps because, like so much of his verse, it speaks of an eternal truth.
From the establishment of Oxford, our first great seat of learning, in the 11th century, universities developed as places for reflection, thought and study.
So it is a tragic irony that institutions which were once bastions of free thought and expression have become the exact opposite.
At the mercy of a “woke” agenda that seemingly preoccupies most of the liberal elite, universities regularly refuse a platform to anyone, including established scholars, who, in their view, steps out of line or, worse still, has the audacity to think for themselves.
This is typified by recent events at Oxford. The decision to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes from the exterior of Oriel College – later reversed due to financial and regulatory complications – was not driven by a desire to understand the past, but to sanitise it.
Rhodes was a complex figure, both a champion of empire and a generous endower of education. Stating in his will that all races should have the chance to benefit from Rhodes scholarships, he was a keen advocate of extending voting rights to indigenous African people.
Those Oxford dons who have chosen to impoverish their students’ education by boycotting the college in protest at the decision to retain the memorial clearly know little about the man or the Empire.
If they did, they might at least appreciate why so many of those who arrived in Britain from former colonies after the Second World War were proud of what they saw as their “mother country” and why so many of those colonies, following independence, chose to join the Commonwealth, remaining delighted that Her Majesty The Queen is at its head.
Similarly, it would be easy to dismiss the decision to remove a por
trait of our Queen, head of the Commonwealth, from the common room at Magdalen College, Oxford, as student politics, were it not part of a wider trend to “cancel” everything in our culture that doesn’t fit the “woke” mould.
Tellingly, the motion to remove the portrait was tabled by a student from the birthplace of puritanical “wokeness” – the United States – where elements of the public, from the Salem witch trials through to the Red scares of the 20th century, have long been susceptible to periodic hysteria.
Such campaigns are part of the wider movement to “decolonialise” the whole of academia. Every subject, including maths and the sciences, must be stripped of anything perceived as “white privilege”, even when this compromises scholarship.
The “woke” agenda is intolerant of freedom of speech precisely because its half-baked theories are too flimsy to withstand detailed scrutiny. For “wokes”, Western colonialism should be condemned as an unmitigated evil and our historic national identity must be seen as intrinsically racist.
Anyone who questions this must be “cancelled”. Like universities, multinational corporations have jumped on the bandwagon because it is a cost-free way of signalling their virtue. Ikea, a company
recently fined one million euros for using private investigators to spy on its staff in France, decided to pull advertising from GB News – a decision since rescinded – because the new TV channel is committed to doing more than just echoing the prejudices of the metropolitan elite.
To think and speak freely is the foundation of an open society.
One might think that institutions which, in the words of Cardinal Newman, are “the great ordinary means to a great but ordinary end… raising the intellectual tone of society” would be the champions of contrasting ideas. Yet it seems many in higher education are the enemies of freedom and those that are not are intimidated into silent acquiescence.
Which is why the Government is right to introduce legislation which will place a new duty on universities to promote lawful freedom of speech and academic freedom. By these legislative means, the “wokes” who fuel fear and feed hate will be pursued and punished.
Free speech is not a given. In most of the world, only words which suit those with power are permitted to be written or spoken.
Without the freedom to say what they think, people are poorer; without laws to defend such precious rights, nations are weaker; and without the chance to read and hear and contest all kinds of ideas, future generations are robbed of their chance to flourish.
Rhodes in his will wanted all races to benefit from his education bequests